Student life gets passing grade

by Peter Sielski

Thursday, March 29, 2007 00:00

More University of Wisconsin students are satisfied with their college experience today than a decade ago, according to survey results released Wednesday by university officials.

However, administrators said they are still concerned with the number of transfer and minority students who reported being dissatisfied with UW.

The survey was conducted by the Wisconsin Center for Advancement of Postsecondary Education during the spring 2006 semester and polled 1,300 randomly selected undergraduates.

In 1993, only 40 percent of UW students surveyed reported being "extremely satisfied" with their college experience. However, that number jumped to 61 percent in the survey released Wednesday.

The 2006 survey also reported that 97 percent of students polled said they agreed with the statement that they were "proud to be a Badger."

However, the WISCAPE survey also revealed that transfer and diversity students were the least satisfied in all categories related to general satisfaction with the college experience, including the ability to socialize with someone who has a similar background.

"We need to keep looking at the gap between minority students and majority students, as well as transfer students and non-transfer students," said Eric Knueve, advisor for Adventure Learning Programs. "I think those gaps are more telling then anything else that we still have work to do."

Currently, WISCAPE is trying to spread awareness on the figures as they analyze the data and decide what needs be improved and how.

"We're still in the process of working out what the data tells us and figuring out what makes most sense to be changing," said Margaret Harrigan, senior policy and planning analyst of WISCAPE. "We haven't gotten to the point of knowing what steps we're going to take based on the data."

Although no action is under way yet, Knueve said the solution may lie in getting out of the office and making connections all around campus through talking about the issue.

"Overall, we should be pretty happy with the institution that people are getting what they need," Knueve said.

Other problems students reported in the survey, according to Harrigan, included overall satisfaction in the UW learning experience.

"I would like to see students more fully engaged in learning," UW professor emeritus of economics W. Lee Hansen said. "I think people learn in different ways, so we should vary our methods of teaching."

According to the survey, 85 percent of students polled were happy with UW libraries, putting it at the top of the students' list of satisfactions. Students surveyed were also generally happy with recreational sports.

However, surveyed students reported being most dissatisfied with the Associated Student of Madison student government — only 30 percent of students said they were satisfied with the program.

Academic and Career Advising also received poor satisfaction marks among surveyed students, which was a major concern for those at the presentation.

"We still have a ways to go with [student advising services]," Harrigan said. "The question is: Do we need to give students different expectations, or do we need to invest more into what [students] want?"